HOW TO MANAGE BUSINESSES DURING THE PANDEMIC IN COVID 19

To manage your healthcare business well in this uncertain and challenging period, the key is to let everyone adjust their work habits and business goals as much as possible. By acting quickly to redefine the status quo, you will have greater resilience than ever before, and you will be able to turn things around better.

Due to social distancing regulations, most employees are unable to work in the same office every day. Business continuity is likely to depend on your remote working ability. Therefore, the need for tests your company's IT and computer systems to ensure that employees have access to all the tools and functions they need to perform their duties safely and securely at home.

Of course, you need to ensure that employees are equipped with the required mobile devices, such as tablets and laptops, but if you use internal servers to store and access corporate information and software, you must also consider other factors besides tools.

In addition, it is also critical to ensure that any employee facing consumers or customers can use phone or video conferencing at home to replace office-based calls or meetings.

The message here is that you should make every effort to maintain a dialogue between you and your employees, while encouraging other managers in your company to do the same. In other words, I would rather face the risk of over- communication than lack of communication. 

                  

In addition to encouraging open conversations and email exchanges between employees, it can also be beneficial to establish more organized communication to ensure close contact between everyone. The methods that can be adopted include regular teams and one-on-one meetings via video calls, or daily email summaries and phone calls to address goals and priorities.

During the period of responding to the Covid-19 epidemic, many companies have reduced the number of employees (even if only temporarily), but it is still important to retain key employees to ensure business continuity.

In recent weeks, due to the introduction of social distancing measures in response at covid-19 epidemic, many people have to work full-time or part-time at home. Therefore, employers should help employees take care of their mental health at home.          

         

To avoid the potential adverse consequences caused by the decline in mental health, the key is to encourage employees to maintain resilience, adaptability and collaboration. A recent World Health Organization report on "mental health and psychosocial considerations during the covid-19 bluetongue outbreaks" emphasizes that isolation can have specific negative effects on our mental health, such as increased stress, anxiety, anger and irritability. There can be no doubt that all these consequences will weaken our ability to work effectively and deal with daily stress.

In the short term, mental health will have a huge impact on job performance. The World Health Organization points out that the reduced production efficiency due to poor mental health causes a loss of US$1 trillion to the global economy every year. Today, maintaining good mental health in your team helps ensure that employees stay healthy and are ready to return to a "normal state" so that they can cope with the possible surge in workloads when they return to the office.

In fact, you can take the following measures to improve your employees' mental health at home.

Careful management of your communication style is also critical. When communicating with employees, your tone should not only show a calm and rational side, but also show an approachable leadership style-not only to appease employees, but also to properly resolve any problems or concerns of employees.

Having a two-way dialogue with employees about their own remote work experience also helps foster employee loyalty and strong employee relationships. However, you also need to pay attention to what the employee did not say. Creating and emphasizing an inclusive environment in the current situation will help create a continuous sense of comfort and trust for employees when they share problems and challenge with them for long for coming.

The self-evident social element of working side by side with others plays a vital role in maintaining our mental health at home. Therefore, do not let this situation go wrong during the entire period of the covid-19 pandemic.

Team leaders should consider how to use digital technology to inject interesting social elements into their work time, such as virtual coffee or tea breaks, online group games, theme costume competitions, virtual birthday parties, and achievement celebrations.  

                 

Creating a WhatsApp group or using video conferencing software is also a good way to continue to create a sense of presence among colleagues. All these techniques for maintaining contact and cohesion can make colleagues feel that they have not lost contact with each other or that they do not need to build relationships from scratch after returning to the office.

So far, the ability to work from home has itself been associated with increased flexibility and adaptability at the workplace, which helps to improve mental health. But now, to give every employee flexibility and get the best results from new ways of working, companies must go further.

You may need to give employees more flexibility throughout the week, and one of the biggest reasons is that many parents have to strike a balance between home education and full-day childcare. Allow your employees to work in shifts or even shorten the weekly working hours, which can help them eliminate some of the extra pressure in the current situation.

For example, let your employees do some physical exercises during the day, such as walking, cycling, or even using a home gym. You can also give employees more free time to pursue some other personal goals, such as learning a language, practicing music or engaging in artistic activities.

In order to avoid the feeling of duplication every day, try to change your management style to ensure that everyone on the team changes throughout the work week. For example, employees can make full use of this time to focus on career development, or master multi-skill training by collaborating with others to complete new projects.

If possible, be sure to remind employees of the resources (internal or external) they can use at work, such as consultants or support hotlines. On the other hand, if you are not sure, which resources are available, please contact the human resources department, they can help you find the most suitable support for employees in the current situation.

Not all managers can give employees the mental health support they need. In this case, it is important for all leaders to be able to recognize their limitations and know what alternative measures should be taken. This initiative can provide employees with relevant ways to maintain their mental health at the current time and during the transition period before returning to the office.

Home mental health is a top priority. Working remotely does not mean you are powerless to maintain the mental health of your team’s home. Although it is necessary to maintain balance and autonomy, adopting some unique strategies during this time can help employees maintain their work efficiency and at the same time allow them to rebound well to "normal life".                   

If this is not possible, you may face the risk of competitors taking the lead when your business is back on track.

Taking a more flexible approach to respond to employment needs is a way to ensure that you have the resources you need at all times. In other words, combining temporary and long-term employees can help you maintain business continuity during difficult times while reducing long-term financial burdens.

The current business environment emphasizes the need to be truly flexible, which not only refers to the flexibility of strategy, but also the flexibility of business activities. By following some guidelines on how to manage your business during the covid-19 pandemic, you will be able to get through this period better and be prepared to regain your strength and become more resilient.

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